n you persuade anybody that you
have known nothing about it?"

"Ha! infamous joke! I wish, sir, you would play your pranks on somebody
else," said Hippias, sternly, as he sank back on the sofa. "You've done
me up for the day, I can assure you."

Adrian sat down to instil belief by gentle degrees, and put an artistic
finish to the work. He had the gratification of passing his uncle through
varied contortions, and at last Hippias perspired in conviction, and
exclaimed, "This accounts for his conduct to me. That boy must have a
cunning nothing short of infernal! I feel...I feel it just here, he drew
a hand along his midriff.

"I'm not equal to this world of fools," he added faintly, and shut his
eyes. "No, I can't dine. Eat? ha!...no. Go without me!"

Shortly after, Hippias went to bed, saying to himself, as he undressed,
"See what comes of our fine schemes! Poor Austin!" and as the pillow
swelled over his ears, "I'm not sure that a day's fast won't do me good."
The Dyspepsy had bought his philosophy at a heavy price; he had a right
to use it.

Adrian resumed the procession of the cake.

He sighted his melancholy uncle Algernon hunting an appetite in the Row,
and looking as if the hope ahead of him were also one-legged. The Captain
did not pass with out querying the ungainly parcel.

"I hope I carry it ostentatiously enough?" said Adrian.

"Enclosed is wherewithal to quiet the alarm of the land. Now may the
maids and wives of Merry England sleep secure. I had half a mind to fix
it on a pole, and engage a band to parade it. This is our dear Richard's
wedding-cake. Married at half-past eleven this morning, by licence, at
the Kensington parish church; his own ring being lost he employed the
ring of his beautiful bride's lachrymose land-lady, she standing adjacent
by the altar. His farewell to you as a bachelor, and hers as a maid, you
can claim on the spot if you think proper, and digest according to your
powers."

Algernon let off steam in a whistle. "Thompson, the solicitor's
daughter!" he said. "I met them the other day, somewhere about here. He
introduced me to her. A pretty little baggage.

"No." Adrian set him right. "'Tis a Miss Desborough, a Roman Catholic
dairymaid. Reminds one of pastoral England in the time of the
Plantagenets! He's quite equal to introducing her as Thompson's daughter,
and himself as Beelzebub's son. However, the wild animal is in Hymen's
chains, and the cake is cut. Will you have your